Deadly Earthquake Rocks China: What Happened?

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    Earthquake
In summary: I don't remember exactly, but something big and heavy fell off the shelf above me and crashed to the floor, cracking the glass on the monitor. Thankfully, everything else in the room was solid, and I wasn't hurt. After that, I always made sure to have an emergency escape route planned out in case of an earthquake.
  • #1
rewebster
877
2
Earthquake! in Illinois!

Earthquake rattles Tri-State

http://www.courierpress.com/news/2008/apr/18/earthquake-rattles-tri-state/ [Broken]

I woke up to a noise--looked at the clock 4:35--like the wind rattling the window--but it was one of the paintings on the wall rattling against the wall.
-----I thought--oh--tremor---about 20 secs later the whole house shook---

EARTHWAKE!

----it felt like the house moved up and down about 1/4 to 1/2 inch. To me it lasted about 5 seconds on the main 'one'. But the 'rattling' kept up for another 3 minutes.
 
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  • #2
That was a pretty good one for the central US.

http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/recenteqsus/Maps/US2/38.40.-89.-87.php [Broken]

http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/eqinthenews/2008/us2008qza6/ [Broken]

5.2 Mag (revised down from 5.4 Mag)
Friday, April 18, 2008 at 09:36:56 UTC
Friday, April 18, 2008 at 04:36:56 AM at epicenter

Location: 38.520°N, 87.873°W
Depth: 11.6 km (7.2 miles) - (revised from 5 km (3.1 miles)) set by location program (qhite shallow)
Region ILLINOIS

Distances:
12 km (7 miles) E (90°) from West Salem, IL
13 km (8 miles) NE (53°) from Bone Gap, IL
14 km (9 miles) W (266°) from Allendale, IL
36 km (22 miles) WSW (241°) from Vincennes, IN
67 km (41 miles) NNW (335°) from Evansville, IN
206 km (128 miles) E (93°) from St. Louis, MO

Source Center for Earthquake Research and Information, Memphis, Tennessee, USA
 
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  • #3
I'm about 60 miles away. I lived in California for 7 years from the mid 50's to the early 60's--young at the time---I can't remember one this big when I lived there---

The epicenter from the USGS puts it about 120 miles away from me----I trust the USGS over that first newspaper report
 
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  • #4
Thats always a creepy feeling, glad no one was hurt.
 
  • #5
Being in England, we don't get many earthquakes over here, but we had one a couple of months ago.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/7266136.stm" [Broken]

It was really surreal. I was listening to music at the time, and managed to convince myself it was my bopping my leg against the desk. Then, when it got stronger, I took my headphone off, and couldn't work out what it was. Again, I managed to convince myself that maybe something in my housemate's room had fallen over, or something. I didn't realize it was an earthquake until the next day when my friends were all talking about it! :blushing: :rofl:
 
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  • #6
I've survived quite a few in Japan, even killers. I worked in a steel frame building with corrugated sheet metal walls and roof. When a quake would come, the building would shake and rattle. But it would never roll. Everybody ran for the pillars and doorways though.
 
  • #7
There are some scattered reports of gas leaks, things falling off shelving, and some building damage--the main one they show is the one building in Louisville that had some bricks fall.
 
  • #8
Wow! Glad to hear there isn't too much damage.

We had a pretty big one a here in western Washington State a few years back. I was at the vet at the time, in a little examination room. I scooped up my cat and went towards the door to get out of the building...but I soon realized there was no way I could open the door. There were FREAKED-OUT CATS RUNNING EVERYWHERE! (The clinic is cats only!)

My kitty was terrified, clawed me pretty good around my neck.
 
  • #9
I looked around and found this:

"5.0 is equal to 32 kilotons which is similar to the nuke that was dropped on Nagasaki."

http://paddymac.wordpress.com/2008/02/27/a-whole-lot-of-shakin-going-on/

"A 6.0 earthquake is equivalent to 1 megaton of TNT."

so, (I'm guessing a little here) that the earthquake that just happened had the 'equivalent' of, maybe, the energy of both atomic bombs that were dropped--my, my, my

I thought it could have been the in 'New Madrid' area when it was happening.
 
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  • #10
We just had an aftershock about two minutes ago---guess it was a 2. something if I guessed compared to the other one

from the USGS it looks like a 4.something:

http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/recenteqsus/Maps/US10/32.42.-95.-85.gif [Broken]


it knocked my power out for a second

The 'new' red block covered over 5 or 6 smaller quakes -aftershocks--that I didn't feel after that first one
 
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  • #11
Glad it wasn't worse Rew! I have never been in an earthquake, not keen about being in one either.
 
  • #12
Magnitude 4 aftershocks occurred at 10:15 AM central time, didn't feel a thing.

I remember one time many years ago I was reading quietly then suddenly my glass of water, and the computer monitor started vibrating. I didn't think nothing of it until I checked the news later during the day. It was reported a strong earthquake hit Turkey halfway across the world. The shockwave must have been reflected to my location. It was weird.
 
  • #13
lisab said:
We had a pretty big one a here in western Washington State a few years back.

Hey, I felt that one too! I was working at my first physics job in the basement of an aging university building where the ceiling was solid brick. I was working at the computer when my monitor suddenly started doing the hula. I swiveled around in my chair and the professor at the table behind me put his hands out on the bench. "Hey, I think this is an earthquake!" The motion was like sitting on a floating dock. I looked up at the ceiling and then down at the rickety table that my computer was on and decided I was probably wasting my time if I crawled under it. I decided I'd had a pretty good life.

Another guy in my lab had been working on a "floating table" - it suddenly started bucking up and down and he really freaked out. The other people who were standing didn't even notice the motion though. And professors lecturing in classes didn't notice either - until their students (who were sitting down) started getting twitchy.

I also felt the aftershock of the 2006 earthquake on the big island in Hawaii. The door started rattling in a funny way and a bunch of the neighbour's car alarms went off.
 
  • #14
rewebster said:
EARTHWAKE!
:rofl: That's a good term for one at that hour of the morning. Nobody has commented on feeling anything this far out from it, but I've slept through tremors that woke up everyone else in the house before. I'd have probably just blamed it on the cat for jumping on the bed if I felt anything shaking at that hour. :rolleyes:
 
  • #15
Moonbear said:
:rofl: That's a good term for one at that hour of the morning. Nobody has commented on feeling anything this far out from it, but I've slept through tremors that woke up everyone else in the house before. I'd have probably just blamed it on the cat for jumping on the bed if I felt anything shaking at that hour. :rolleyes:

That's about my experience. In Ohio, a very small one where I happened to be swimming at the time. I eventually came out of the water, heard everyone talking about 'the earthquake', and wondered what the heck they were talking about (I initially thought a major earthquake must have hit California for everyone to be talking about it). In California, I slept through another very small earthquake, so had no idea what people were talking about the next morning.
 
  • #16
I've lived up and down the west coast all my life, so I've felt several quakes.

By far the weirdest one was when I worked on a fish processing ship in the Aluetian Chain, in Alaska. The ship jumped vertically with a sudden, violent "POP!" It must have jumped a couple of centimeters.

At the time, we were anchored in a shallow bay. At the time I didn't know earthquake waves could travel through water (I've since learned that the P-waves do, but not the S-waves).

I was really worried...I asked if we should we be checking the rivets, or checking for cracks in the hull. An old guy who'd been at sea for, well, forever, assured me no, ships get hit by earthquakes all the time up here, it's no big deal.

It was very strange.
 
  • #17
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/recenteqsus/index.gif [Broken] the last seven days --

it'd be hard to not be around them up there in AK--no wonder he said that, lisab
 
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  • #18
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/recenteqsus/Maps/US2/44.46.-70.-68.gif [Broken]

hmmm--even two up in Maine
 
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  • #19
rewebster said:
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/recenteqsus/index.gif [Broken] the last seven days --

it'd be hard to not be around them up there in AK--no wonder he said that, lisab

Wow, that's a great graphic! Yep, Alaskans get shook up on a regular basis.
 
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  • #20
lisab said:
I've lived up and down the west coast all my life, so I've felt several quakes.

By far the weirdest one was when I worked on a fish processing ship in the Aluetian Chain, in Alaska. The ship jumped vertically with a sudden, violent "POP!" It must have jumped a couple of centimeters.

At the time, we were anchored in a shallow bay. At the time I didn't know earthquake waves could travel through water (I've since learned that the P-waves do, but not the S-waves).

I was really worried...I asked if we should we be checking the rivets, or checking for cracks in the hull. An old guy who'd been at sea for, well, forever, assured me no, ships get hit by earthquakes all the time up here, it's no big deal.

It was very strange.

I heard recently that Alaska actually has several earthquakes a day! They get 1/10 of the world's seismic activity there. You just don't hear much about it because so much of the state is unpopulated or sparsely populated that it hardly ever damages anything worth reporting (and I guess they get so many that it isn't really news to them).
 
  • #21
It was a warning for Indiana: Elect Obama or else!

I've been in a few good ones, the most notable being the 1971 Sylmar quake in California that took down, among other things, a hospital [Olive View Medical Center], and the I-5 freeway. It was a mag 6.9 quake.

We are due for a 9.0+ subduction zone quake here in the Pacific NW.
 
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  • #22
Heard this on the radio today. The people were like "OMG THINGS WERE SHAKING!" Yeah, it happens, get a grip.

Geez... I've only been through 2 earthquakes myself, but both were like "Oh... it's an earthquake. Umm... I should get to a doorway or something." It was hardly "the big one".
 
  • #23
Poop-Loops said:
Heard this on the radio today. The people were like "OMG THINGS WERE SHAKING!" Yeah, it happens, get a grip.

Geez... I've only been through 2 earthquakes myself, but both were like "Oh... it's an earthquake. Umm... I should get to a doorway or something." It was hardly "the big one".

From some of the descriptions, I think my house shook more when they were grading the road behind me (THAT woke me up, especially when glasses started crashing to the floor and things in the attic started toppling from the shelves I had them on...I wanted to strangle the guy operating the grader for not giving anyone advanced notice this was planned).
 
  • #24
Felt both the original and the largest aftershock. My wife shot out of bed and was running around the house asking is we should get to the basement, I just rolled over and said "it's an earthquake, not a tornado". The large aftershock happened while I was at work, I felt it on the 4th floor, but the 3rd floor didn't really notice until all the spouses started calling.
 
  • #25
Archduke said:
Being in England, we don't get many earthquakes over here, but we had one a couple of months ago.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/7266136.stm" [Broken]

It was really surreal. I was listening to music at the time, and managed to convince myself it was my bopping my leg against the desk. Then, when it got stronger, I took my headphone off, and couldn't work out what it was. Again, I managed to convince myself that maybe something in my housemate's room had fallen over, or something. I didn't realize it was an earthquake until the next day when my friends were all talking about it! :blushing: :rofl:

If felt that, I was playing poker online at the time, everything seemed to be wobbling and I was confused as to what was happening, first I though maybe a train going by but it was way too shaky for that. I though that it felt like an earthquake but then we don't get them here supposedly. I could see my computer monitor rocking and feel the sofa move size to side then up and down. I ran to the doorway just in case the house was going to collapase! (better safe than sorry!). I knew it was an earthquake when a lad in the poker room from Hull said he felt it too. Was reported as size 5.2, not very big really but I would not like to experience anything much bigger! I think it might be something to do with global warming.
 
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  • #26
Earthquakes and global warming...?
 
  • #27
In Oregon, we had an earthquake in the middle of the night. I remember waking up wondering why the wind climes we had hanging it the room were ringing wildly.
 
  • #28
Ivan Seeking said:
We are due for a 9.0+ subduction zone quake here in the Pacific NW.

Yes, I am periodically reminded of that and it completely freaks me out.

For those that don't know, a 9.0 is 10x stronger than an 8.0, etc. So a 9.0 would be like 10,000 times stronger than that weak sauce 5.X those guys felt.
 
  • #29
Poop-Loops said:
Yes, I am periodically reminded of that and it completely freaks me out.

For those that don't know, a 9.0 is 10x stronger than an 8.0, etc. So a 9.0 would be like 10,000 times stronger than that weak sauce 5.X those guys felt.

In the 6.9 quake, my dad was literally thrown into the air by a transverse wave [vertical displacement] that traveled through our house. He said that one moment he was running for our room to get my brother and I out of bed, and the next moment he was airborn and making a belly-flop onto the floor in the hallway. From there he was barely able to stay on his feet.
 
  • #30
My mom was outside when we had the last "big" quake here a few years ago and she said she saw things just waving up and down. Must have been pretty trippy. I was in class at the time and just hid under my desk like a good boy, but I remember after the main shaking you could feel as if you were on a wave in the ocean. That was pretty cool.
 
  • #31
That area in Illinois had a small swarm of earthquakes, and there was a small one to the southwest down near the intersection of the borders of MO, TN, and KY.

Code:
      UTC-TIME   LAT      LON    DEPTH                   
Mag     h:m:s    deg      deg     km      LOCATION
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
2008/04/19
2.7   03:05:52  38.474  -87.795   2.9    7 km ( 4 mi) NNW of Mount Carmel, IL 

2008/04/18
[b]4.6   15:14:16  38.478  -87.869  10.0   11 km ( 7 mi) NNE of Bellmont, IL[/b] 
2.6   11:55:57  38.465  -87.854  10.0    9 km ( 6 mi) NW of Mount Carmel, IL 
2.2   10:46:24  38.440  -87.880  17.8    7 km ( 4 mi) NNE of Bellmont, IL 
3.4   10:36:33  38.460  -87.860  17.8    9 km ( 6 mi) NNE of Bellmont, IL 
2.5   10:15:31  38.464  -87.846  10.0    9 km ( 5 mi) NW of Mount Carmel, IL 
2.5   10:03:59  38.453  -87.805  10.0    5 km ( 3 mi) NW of Mount Carmel, IL 
2.6   09:59:31  38.469  -87.795  10.0    6 km ( 4 mi) NNW of Mount Carmel, IL 
[b]5.2   09:37:00  38.450  -87.890  11.6    7 km ( 5 mi) NNE of Bellmont, IL[/b]

In addition to the Mag 8 or 9 expected in the NW along the Pacific Subduction zone, it's also possible to have one around southern Missouri.


Summary of the 4.6 mag - http://earthquakes.usgs.gov/eqcenter/recenteqsus/Quakes/us2008qzbw.php#details [Broken]
 
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  • #32
I don't know if anyone noticed--but the 'images' of the locations of the earthquacks (duck!) are not static in the earlier posts--


-they are 'updated' directly from the USG in real time on each refresh of the thread after one happens
 
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  • #33
http://earthquakes.usgs.gov/eqcenter/recenteqsus/Maps/AK2/51.53.-180.-176.gif [Broken]

194 just in the last week in this 'end' part of the Aleutian Chain
 
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  • #34
rewebster said:
194 just in the last week in this 'end' part of the Aleutian Chain
Those images change about every 15 minutes.

The Aleutian chain is one of the most seismically active regions in the world. It's on the northern boundary of the Pacific Ring of Fire.

Another active area is boundary between Asia and Pacific plates, and between those two and the Australian plate. The area along the Sunda trench, basically the western and southern sides of Indonesia are also very seismically active, and out past Papua/New Guinea, Fiji, Tonga, and then south to New Zealand.


As for the midwest - it's worth keeping an eye on it.

Scientists say Midwest quakes poorly understood
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080419/ap_on_re_us/midwest_earthquake [Broken]
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Scientists say they know far too little about Midwestern seismic zones like the one that rumbled to life under southern Illinois Friday morning, but some of what they do know is unnerving.

The fault zones beneath the Mississippi River Valley have produced some of the largest modern U.S. quakes east of the Rockies, a region covered with old buildings not built to withstand seismic activity.

And, when quakes happen, they're felt far and wide, their vibrations propagated over hundreds of miles of bedrock.

Friday's quake shook things up from Nebraska to Atlanta, rattling nerves but doing little damage and seriously hurting no one. It was a magnitude 5.2 temblor centered just outside West Salem in southeastern Illinois, a largely rural region of small towns that sit over the Wabash fault zone. The area has produced moderately strong quakes as recently as 2002.

The Mississippi River was realigned because of earthquakes, and Lake Reelfoot in Tennessee was also formed by those earthquakes.

The strongest quake produced in recent history by the Wabash was a magnitude 5.3 in southern Illinois in 1968, but researchers have found evidence that 4,000 to 6,000 years ago, much stronger quakes shook the region, Kim said, as strong as magnitude 7.0 or more.
 
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  • #35
Another aftershock woke me last night----check the map in post #10
 

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